Six children have drowned while skating on a river

Six children have drowned while skating on a river in a rural area of northern China, a local government said Sunday.

The children aged 5 to 11 were skating together Saturday afternoon near a village in Pingyao county in Shanxi province, the county government said on its official microblog.

After residents alerted police that children had fallen in, rescuers were sent to the scene. About an hour later, they pulled out four bodies. It took divers another 1 ½ hour to find the bodies of the remaining two children.

The county government statement said an investigation was ongoing. Calls to the authority and police rang unanswered Sunday.